Denmark is the latest EU country to hammer its livestock farmers, imposing a “meat tax” of up to £80 per dairy cow in order to help meet national net zero targets. It’s a step that makes this Remain voting farmer glad that we are out of the EU. The bloc seems in thrall to the anti-meat lobby, that unholy alliance between politicians, Big Food corporates and Leftist eco-modernists.
As a dairy farmer it makes little sense, but of course I would say that, wouldn’t I. I accept that cows burp methane but we can’t be entirely sure how much of that methane finds its way into the atmosphere. We know that cows out at grass, as ours are, are more likely to be close to methanotrophs, bacteria that consume methane near ground level. We also know that methane is short lived in the atmosphere and a cow burp from 2012 will most likely have been transformed into carbon dioxide and water vapour by now.
I accept that animals kept inside don’t have the same relationship with the soil and there is a case for differentiating between the two systems, certainly by labelling to inform consumers and probably also by some form of incentive for farmers. At the moment, ironically, grass based systems are penalised because they produce “too much” milk in the spring.
Then there is the utter incoherence of comparisons between animal meat and milk and the plant based alternatives. On a weight for weight basis, plant based milks may well have a lower carbon footprint. But when you compare the nutrients immediately available to sustain humans from animal foods against plant foods, real milk appears to have a far lower carbon footprint per gram of protein than almond or soy milk. On top of that, we would likely be using a great deal more fossil fuel to manufacture leather, artificial manures and so on without livestock.
I am sceptical that the costs and benefits stack up. And the unintended consequences will be felt by us all. Denmark is home to one of the world’s biggest dairy cooperatives, Arla. They will be keen to pass on this new tax in the form of higher milk prices as soon as possible. Food prices will rise. And, of course, the Danish farmers least able to pay this new tax – small family farms running cows at pasture – will be more likely to fail, consolidating the dairy industry into fewer, bigger, industrialised units that probably have a bigger impact on the natural environment.
Labour has so far ruled out a meat tax but if they win their desire to align us more closely with the EU may bring this lunacy into play. It should be resisted.
Jamie Blackett is a farmer